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| Pâ•qidꞋ Yi•rᵊmᵊyâhꞋ u |
2k.10.24 – Due to the sheer volume of information, covering many fast-moving incidents, and analysis complicated by contradictory reports by journalists, it has taken more time than usual to post the
"… It is a double outrage. The first outrage is Yasser Arafat's crass betrayal of the hopes of peace. He had the chance to move toward an agreement, or toward a confrontation. Sadly, he chose the latter. The second outrage is the way the media misrepresented the crisis, which encouraged Arafat in his despicable power play." (Excerpts from Editorial, 2k.10.23, p. 75-6. Thanks to L.V.N. in Orlando, FL)
"The riots have been presented as a spontaneous popular uprising to protest the visit to the Jewish shrine at Temple Mount by Ariel Sharon and a group of Israeli members of Parliament [
KᵊnësꞋët ; ybd]. In fact, the Arab violence was premeditated. Sharon's visit had been approved the day before by Jibril Rajoub, the head of the Palestinian Authority's Preventive Security service. Rajoub stated there would be no reaction…" (U.S. News & World Report, loc. cit.)
"The story seems to begin on [2k.09.28], when Israeli hardliner Ariel Sharon decided to pay a provocative visit to the Jerusalem site both Jews and Muslims hold most holy… 2000: [Sharon] Visits Al Aqsa Mosque, sparking the second Palestinian intifada (uprising). " ("The many minds of Arafat," Time Magazine, 2k.10.23, p. 48ff).
This is blatant miso-Judaicb and anti-Israel misrepresentation of fact by Time reporters. Arab-occupied Har ha-
In fact, however, "Palestinian" escalation began a "few weeks" prior to 2k.10.27, well before Sharon's visit to Har ha-
"2000: Visits Al Aqsa Mosque sparking the second Palestinian intifada."
"This too is false. Sharon did not enter any mosque at all. He visited the Temple Mount, the site of Israel's First and Second Temples and Judaism's holiest area.
"Contrary to the claim that the Sharon's visit caused the Palestinian uprising, anti-Israel violence actually preceded Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount with an increase in Palestinian attacks against Israeli soldiers and civilians and an ambush of an Israeli convoy at the Netzarim junction in Gaza. While Sharon's one-hour visit passed uneventfully, an Israeli soldier was murdered on a joint patrol with his Palestinian counterpart and riots erupted after Muslim prayers on the Temple Mount the following day.
"Statements by Palestinian officials further substantiate the fact that Sharon's visit was never the issue and that the intifada was "planned in advance, ever since President Arafat's return from the Camp David negotiations [in July, 2000]…" (Palestinian Communications Minister al-Faluji, quoted in Al-Safir, March 3, 2001)
CAMERA contacted then-foreign editor Michael Hirsh to urge a careful review and correction of the biased and inaccurate timeline feature. However, Hirsh refused to discuss or consider the matter." (camera.org).
Prior to Sharon's visit, Palestinian Preventive Security Service chief Jibril Rajoub was able to predict that "riots would not be limited to Jerusalem, but erupt everywhere in the territories and trigger a sharp response from Arab states as well. He said the Palestinians would not try to calm the riots, since they would be the result of a blatant provocation" (JP, 2k.10.27, p. 1). He was able to predict it because he was planning it. The Palestinians had decided that, no matter how peaceful Sharon's visit might turn out, it would be their excuse of "blatant provocation" to launch the 'Temple Mount' War. No different from their lying about the opening of the tunnel entrance to launch the bloodletting riots of 96.09. Recognize the pattern.
"But that's only the last chapter in a crisis that traces its roots back to Maryland, at Camp David, in [2k07]. (Time, 2k.10.23, p. 49)
"Arafat did not want to be there. He had warned President Clinton that he was not ready for the hard decisions of a final settlement, and the CIA had been advising the Administration for some time that ordinary Palestinians were even less so… But Clinton and Prime Minister Ehud Barak had urgent reasons to get a deal done: fearful violence could quickly erupt, Clinton had a legacy to secure before leaving office, and Barak needed to fulfill his promise of peace to hold on to his…" (Time, 2k.10.23, p. 49)
"As a Tanzim [Arafat's organization of street-soldiers] chief tells it, [one of two of Arafat's Tanzim chief warlords, Marwan] Barghouti had visited Arafat in his Ramallah office the day before. 'What do you think of Sharon's visit?' Barghouti asked. Arafat allegedly responded, 'I want to light a fire, and I want it to burn the Israelis.'" (Time, 2k.10.23, p. 53)
"The Muslim mullah at the mosque on [the Arab-occupied] Temple Mount called for Muslims to 'eradicate the Jews from Palestine.' Schools were closed [by deliberate design so that children would be sent out by their parents, bowing to peer pressure, to stone Israeli soldiers and become martyrs; ybd] students and others were bused to the [Arab-occupied] Temple Mount to participate in rioting. After hurling rocks at the Jewish worshipers, the mob then attempted to break through the western gate of the [Arab-occupied Temple] Mount in order to descend to the [
One Muslim attempted to convince a journalist that Arabs couldn't possibly hurl large stones from inside the compound up over a high wall down onto Jews at the
Israel's adversaries are Arabs, predominantly Islamic by religion, culture and perspective; not Judaic or European-western Christian culture and perspective. Even aside from the lynching of the two Israeli army reservists who took a wrong turn and wound up in Ramallah – a scene I prefigured more than a week before it happened as "like hyenas on a wounded gazelle" (see commentary on San Jose Mercury-News editorial), the Islamic mentality cannot be grasped by educated and civilized people even when confronted squarely. "Khaled Warasni, 24, a tailor from Hebron, was shot in the back as he turned to gather more stones to throw at Israeli soldiers. When he felt the bullet, Warasni thought he would die a martyr… 'I wished to die,' he says… 'but, unfortunately, I didn't.'" [emphasis added; ybd] (Time Magazine, 2k.10.16, p. 47)
Jaffar, 29, a Hamas field leader: "You ask me about the future? First of all, I can see that I am going to be a martyr one of these days. Sometimes I hope that it will happen shortly. You ask me who gives me moral support. My mother… If Arafat and the Israelis reach a cease-fire, I don't think I'll agree. I don't want anything to do with Arafat's acceptance of Israel. This land does not belong to Arafat or any Palestinian leader. It belongs to the Muslims, so Arafat and others are not qualified to decide the future of this land. I don't think in terms of happiness when I kill an Israeli or wound him. I think in terms of carrying out my religious obligations. I am asked by my God to fight the enemies until the last spot of blood [emphasis added; ybd]." (Time Magazine, 2k.10.23, p. 53)
"If history were written today, Israel and its allies would blame Arafat for missing his best opportunity to found a peaceful Palestinian state. But Palestinians and their Arab brethren would – and do – say history will praise him for having the dignity and strength not to sell them out… Everything that has happened since reflects these opposite visions of reality." (Time, 2k.10.23, p. 51)
Muslim propensity to rewrite history to their liking, however, has no bounds. Besides Palestinian spokeswoman Hanan Ashrawi's laughable claim that Jesus was a Palestinian Arab, "Just as the Arabs deny the Holocaust, they now deny the existence of the First and Second Temples on the Temple Mount. Arafat said, 'That is not the Western Wall at all, but a Muslim shrine.' Arafat's minister of information said, 'Jerusalem is not a Jewish city, despite the biblical myth implanted in some minds.' He added: 'The location of the Temple Mount is in question… It might be in Jericho or somewhere else.' This despite the fact that the Temple Mount had been the geographic heart and spiritual soul of the Jewish people for over 3,000 years." (U.S. News & World Report, loc. cit.)
"No wonder [Pres. Clinton] is furious with Arafat. But has the administration acted wisely? American officials are reluctant to go public with their frustration on the ground that it would end their role as peace brokers and reduce the leverage they may have on the Palestinians. [More accurately, it would end Clinton's egocentric and reckless pursuit to improve his dismal legacy before he leaves office; ybd.] "That is their rationale for abstaining from the one-sided U.N. Security Council resolution that condemned Israel… Such a failure to speak the truth dishonored U.S. integrity. It was craven. It did not win respect in an Arab world that respects power above all and despises conciliation, which the Arabs see as appeasement… A world that wants peace will have to understand that it will have to be tough, really tough, with Arafat and his cohorts. When they get tolerance or sympathy, they use it as a license to pursue diplomatic goals by violence. Israel, which took unprecedented risks for peace [crossing 'red lines' that could never have endured; ybd] deserved better from the world and especially from the United States. It's time for Clinton to follow through on comments he made after Camp David: to decide by the end of the year to move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem [as U.S. law has long required; ybd] and to help Israel enhance its military superiority in the region." (U.S. News & World Report, loc. cit.)
"This [Arab] excitement has ominous implications. It directly challenges the Egyptian and Jordanian peace treaties with Israel. It sends the oil and stock markets into gyrations. Worst of all, it increases the chances of a full-scale Arab-Israeli war. Some Israelis are cognizant of this; a former aide to Yitzkhaq Rabin explains that 'the image, especially in the media, of a weak Israel, has always led to war.' (Daniel Pipes, Director of the Middle East Forum in Philadelphia)
"Nothing could be more detrimental to Western interests than such a war. The combination of Israeli demoralization and Arab triumphalism suggests the time has come for the United States and other Western states to stop pressing Israel to make concessions and instead to encourage it to adopt a policy of deterrence, to hang tough and to signal to its enemies that they risk terrible consequences if they use violence against it. (Pipes)
"To do this requires the West to adopt a policy quite the reverse of what is now in effect: Rather than urge Israel to comply with the Arabs' wishes, urge it instead to impress them with its resolve to defend its security interests and take steps to show that resolve. (Pipes)
"As unlikely as it sounds, such a policy is now necessary if the outside world wishes to take steps to prevent today's low-intensity conflict in the Middle East from turning into full-scale warfare." (Pipes)
On the positive side, all but the most delusional Leftists have awakened, at least partially, to the reality of Arab savagery. The list of prominent, rabidly peacenik, Leftists who have recognized the Pizza Process for what it is and rejected Oslo – along with its proponents (Barak, Beilin, Peres, Ben-Ami, Rabin & Associates) – continues to grow.
"Today Israel has the most accommodating diplomacy in its history, and is in the most perilous position in its history… (Jerusalem Post, 2k.10.16, p. 8)
"Israel's position is worse today because the threats were military, manageable by an Israeli confident of the legitimacy of its positions. Now, just 17 months of Prime Minister Eihud Barak's diplomacy have demoralized Israel by delegitimizing all its previous principles, and destroying the absolute prerequisite for successful negotiations – the insistence that something is non-negotiable… (Jerusalem Post, 2k.10.16, p. 8)
"Barak may be the most calamitous leader any democracy has ever had. He risks forfeiting his nation's existence… (Jerusalem Post, 2k.10.16, p. 8)
"Barak has made territorial concessions no previous government contemplated, including the sparsely populated and strategically vital Jordan valley. He has thrown away longstanding US support for an undivided Jerusalem. (Jerusalem Post, 2k.10.16, p. 8)
"Under Barak, Israel's rights in its own capital are negotiable. And what has Barak's policy bought? Only Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat's promise to reject violence, which is akin to Hitler's promise after Munich, to make no more territorial claims in Europe. (Jerusalem Post, 2k.10.16, p. 8)
"Barak's attempt to satiate Arafat with a feast of Israeli retreats has even produced the idea of giving the United Nations, that nest of anti-Israeli regimes, control of the Temple Mount. The consequence of all this may be fulfillment of the undisguised aim of Israel's 'partner in peace,' the Palestinian Authority, whose maps, textbooks, and public places, treat Israel as nonexistent… (Jerusalem Post, 2k.10.16, p. 8)
"At Camp David, Arafat reportedly told President Bill Clinton that he himself speaks for a billion Moslems. This inaccurate claim accurately casts the issue: This is not a dispute between Israelis and Palestinians about land, it is a clash of civilizations and is not solvable by splitting differences." (Jerusalem Post, 2k.10.16, p. 8).
As Daniel Pipes points out, "In other words, Israelis are so tired of fighting that even the current spasm of violence does not dissuade them from trying to reach a deal. Even if the negotiations begun in 1993 have not produced the desired results, the country's horror of war leads it to try again and again. Stonings, lynchings and other brutalities do not seem to touch the Israeli conclusion that 'there is no alternative' to Oslo."
"'The alternative to progress in the peace process is violence' is another favorite Leftist slogan with little truth to it. While 'progress' usually is a euphemism for Israeli territorial concessions, the recent round of violence came after Barak offered incredible 'progress.' Indeed, the Israeli concessions that put Arafat in a diplomatic corner were the immediate cause for the violence, rather than lack of 'progress." (Efraim Inbar, Director of the Begin-Sadat for Strategic Studies at Bar-Ilan University, Jerusalem Post, 2k.10.16, p. 8).
What was the Jerusalem Post headline-promise to Arabs and Jews immediately preceding Sharon's visit? "Barak tells 'Post': Jerusalem and Al-Quds will be side by side" (2k.09.28, p. 1). Barak promised the greatest and most generous concession ever (beyond the 'red line' which Jews could endure in the long term). Result: war!
A religious conflict has raged here for three millennia – all seeking to supplant the Jews from
Clinton requires "getting past blame." That's the exact opposite of the necessary historical perspective, a way of avoiding historical imperatives, another way of saying "aggression such as stoning of Jews, fire-bombing of Jews, knifing of Jews, shooting of Jews and blowing up Jews – simply for being Jews in our Jewish homeland – is of no consequence and not worthy of mention." Of course that's a one-way street, implying that even defense against Arab attacks constitutes "excessive force" which requires an "international fact-finding committee." The first thing the "international fact-finding committee" should explain is how Israeli cities and fortified positions keep running out to attack stone- and Molotov cocktail-throwing Arab youths!
CNN Jonathan Mann, Insight (2k.10.21)
Segment entitled "History of the Middle East" represented that the conflict, indeed the history of the Middle East, began with the Holocaust. Such media evasion of both Muslim and Judaic historical claims only further exacerbates feelings of unjust treatment by both sides.
Media assignment of title to the 'Holy Land' begs the question of negotiations. Neither the UN nor the superpower US are so bold as to presume to adjudicate title to the 'Holy Land.' So, why does the world passively allow journalists and the media to "interpret" what neither the UN nor the world's superpower dares? [Media's liberal journalists' agenda arbitrarily misassigns title to the land – misinforming, manipulating and inciting world opinion to miso-Judaic hatred of Israel and Jews. This miso-Judaic media bias, controlling and manipulating world opinion against Israel and Jews, is Israel's greatest enemy and requires the greatest focus of treasure, intellect and effort to remedy.]
When the media is permitted to arbitrarily assign title to the 'Holy Land' to "Palestinians" – a term that was never applied to Arabs prior to 1967, only then is "disputed territory" transformed into "Occupied Arab Lands."
Obviously, only then is there an occupation, an occupying army, and a people "living under occupation"!
"Occupied lands" is an anti-Israel, indeed a miso-Judaic, fiction fabricated by modern Arabs (see 'Palestinian' For Dummies), perpetuated by the media and thrust upon inherently miso-Judaic ally receptive nations.
Removing the farce of Israel being an "occupier" forces a dramatic shift to objective reporting of facts. It becomes impossible to assert that Muslim Arabs, who are daily seen running at and attacking Israeli soldiers huddled in defensive positions, are "being repelled from 'Palestinian' land." Rather, it becomes immediately apparent that Muslim Arabs in disputed areas are attacking Israeli positions in disputed areas, and that Israelis' defensive positions aren't moving at all; strictly defending their defensive positions. Israelis aren't in any way threatening Muslim Arab villages, cities, or even areas which were ceded to them in agreements the Muslim Arabs haven't kept. Many such areas, like Beit
Reporting the totally biased and compromised misrepresentation that "Palestinian children are being shot on their own land by occupying Israeli soldiers" and "Palestinians have the inherent right to revolt against an occupying army" would then give way to objective, unbiased, factual reporting: "Muslim Arabs send their children from Muslim Arab positions in disputed territory to charge Israeli positions in "disputed territory!" The attackers – charging and assaulting the victims – would then become painfully conspicuous to everyone in every night's news.
Consequently, it is absolutely imperative that compromised, unprofessional, unethical and miso-Judaic reporting which begs the question of land title must be replaced by objective journalism which reports, instead, Israeli and Palestinian positions, respectively, in "disputed territories." You, the reader, must insist on these things to every offending TV network and station, every offending newspaper and every offending magazine – at every offense!
Some Jews will complain that this places "Israel Proper" back under dispute. Places like Jerusalem? As if Israel proper isn't already disputed?
Israel's strategy must focus on
minimizing vulnerability which invites attack, as well as maintaining a credible deterrent force (military capability appropriate to every type of threat confronting us coupled with the willingness to unleash the appropriate force)
winning the religio-civilizational conflict between Judaism, on the one hand, and Islam and Christianity on the other hand. This means rational, intellectual, historical and archaeological documentation and hard physical evidence of religious claims to the 'Holy Land.' Jews have an enormous amount of Biblical, historical and archaeological hard physical evidence millennia before Islam was conceived. Muslims, by contrast, have a passage in a comparatively recent Quran which claims the mythical fable that Mohammad flew into the heavens on a magical white horse from "a distant holy place" (Medina; no magic horse ever flew him overnight from Mecca to
Muslim Arabs declaring a state "would formally release Israel from Oslo's restriction against legally changing the status of territory" (Jerusalem Post editorial, 2k.10.16, p. 8).
"The Muslim Arabs have long argued that all Israel understands is force. The Israeli corollary to this assumption is that all the Muslim Arabs understand is facts on the ground. The hard-learned lesson of the last seven years is that Israel could well have to return to the policies of the previous 26 years: that of slowly creating facts on the ground that increase the territorial price of the Muslim Arab refusal to negotiate peace." (Jerusalem Post editorial, 2k.10.16, p. 8) – paid for in Jewish blood and which the Left has given away over the last 7 years getting nothing whatsoever in return except the 'Temple Mount' War. Israel should have de facto, fact-on-the-ground, control of all parts of
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 ÷ÆáÆø Yo•seiphꞋ, ha-Tza•diqꞋ, 2000.10.07 – destroyed and desecrated by Muslim Arab Jihadist "Palestinians" of Arab-occupied |
| ÷ÆáÆø Yo•seiphꞋ, ha-Tza•diqꞋ, burned–again (2015.10.16)–by Muslim Arab Jihadists. And world still learns nothing. |
The Muslim destruction of ÷ÆáÆø
Preparing for this declaration, Israel should assert control over access to Arab-occupied Har ha-
Pundits declare that Israel must now exact "maximum damage to the Muslim Arabs' military infrastructure" (JP editorial, 2k.10.16, p. 8). But the Muslim Arab military isn't the real threat. Certainly, the illegal weapons of the PA "are legitimate targets for destruction" (ibid.). But everyone agrees that the Muslim Arabs' illegal weapons are minuscule compared to Israel's weaponry. The real threat is that this has historically – for three millennia – been, and unavoidably remains, a religious conflict. Besting a religious adversary requires religious strategies – and this is a particularly loathsome thought to Leftists who never want to admit a religious element to the equation.
"With the peace process falling apart, the last thing Israel needs is a civil war. But that is what it almost had in its Arab neighborhoods and towns during the past two weeks. Israel's Arab minority rioted in the Galilee and in major cities like Jaffa and Haifa… The problem is that the 1 million citizens Israel calls Israeli Arabs tend to think of themselves as Muslim Arabs who happen to live in Israel, not as Israelis of Arab descent." (Time Magazine, 2k.10.23, p. 54).
Years before the intifada while serving reserve duty and seeing the situation firsthand, I warned every one in the IDF and Israeli government I could get to listen that ignoring the inequalities inflicted daily on Israeli Arabs must inexorably result in a violent uprising. Ignoring such injustice, simply because these Israeli citizens were Arabs, was a fundamental mistake of the 2nd order. Arab citizens who declare and demonstrate allegiance to Israel as a Jewish state, serving in National Service, deserve to enjoy the same standard of living as any other Israeli citizen. As Yosef Goell pointed out (Jerusalem Post, 2k.10.16, p. 8), Israel needs to immediately implement "speedy programs to turn the Druse communities and many of the Bedouin communities in the Negev into showcases, that would show all the others that Israel does know how to reward its loyal minorities." Since long before the intifada, to the great satisfaction of the Muslim Arabs, Israel has done exactly the opposite.
On the other hand, no democracy allows an ethnic minority to develop as a movement whose aim is to forcibly overthrow the government. Granting citizenship to those who refuse allegiance to Israel and/or refuse to serve Israel in National Service, was a fundamental mistake of the 1st order. Citizenship & voting rights should be withdrawn from anyone refusing to demonstrate allegiance to Israel as a Jewish state or refusing to serve in National Service. Granting exceptions to Jews would promulgate injustice against Arabs. Aside from that, exceptions are unjust. Therefore, the requirement must necessarily include, inter alia, Ultra-Orthodox
Apparently ignoring his own Jerusalem Post article of 2k.10.10 ("Umm el-Fahm lies on one of the most critical internal security roads in the country, the Wadi Ara road"), Yosef Goell recommends "its physical excision from Israel and forced inclusion in the hellhole of the Palestinian Authority" (Jerusalem Post, 2k.10.16, p. 8). Rather, Umm el-Fahm needs to be placed on the list of sites over which Israel must exert control prior to Arafat's declaration of a Muslim Arab State.
(Includes update from Jerusalem Post, 2k.10.27, p. A4)
See my article in the Jerusalem Post: "Shooting to stop, not kill, your assailant" (90.10.28, p. 4). Shooting to kill not only takes additional time to aim at the heart or forehead, time which could get a soldier killed, irresponsible statements advocating "shoot to kill" damage Israel in the media and convict soldiers in court. The solution is simply firing to stop an assailant, which means firing at the center of the torso with the sole intent of stopping the adversary, with no thought, pro or con, about killing. "Shoot to kill" must be relegated to assassination scenarios and the movies. Further, the word "kill" must be expunged from the lexicon of Israeli and IDF spokespersons. Like the political echelon, the IDF must immediately take effective measures to prevent anyone not qualified in both English and PR training from granting interviews.
Clearly, both the political and IDF echelons need to be reminded of the stated policy of the IDF: "The overall IDF strategy is to deprive the Muslim Arabs of the massive number of casualties the army maintains they want in order to win world support and consolidate their fight for independence. 'We are very much trying not to kill them. Deaths only oil the wheels of their intifada,' says Lt.-Col. Yoram Loredo, commander and founder of the [Nakh•shônꞋ] battalion." Jerusalem Post, 2k.10.27, p. A4)
The absurd degree of CNN's bias was demonstrated by "two Palestinian women reporting from the field [as CNN reporters] using the word 'we'… as if CNN had become an agent of the Palestinians" as reported by Gideon Meir, deputy director-general for public affairs in the Foreign Ministry, to Jerusalem Post Radio yesterday." (Jerusalem Post, 28.10.16, p. 4). Perhaps we should refer to CNN as CNN-VOP (Voice of 'Palestine')?
Whose "bullet-ridden body" was found on 2k.10.08 – if the media covered it at all. He was even buried under fire, as Muslim Arabs fired on his funeral, holding up the funeral during an hour-long firefight. "He was unarmed, wearing a
"Their police forces joined [Arafat's] Tanzanim in opening fire on Israelis while putting Muslim Arab children forward at points of confrontation, hoping to create television images that would provoke worldwide sympathy [emphasis added; ybd]. A European film crew managed to get footage of Arafat's Tanzinim militia handing out Molotov cocktails to Muslim Arab teens. The journalists were arrested, their film confiscated." (U.S. News & World Report, loc. cit.)
Even in kindergarten and grade school, Muslim Arab children are taught to hate Jews, kill Jews and seek to become a martyr. It's intrinsic in their schoolbooks. "It takes no orders at all to inspire the impressionable Muslim Arab children who make their way to the front lines. Boys like Imad, a nine-year-old throwing stones at Israeli soldiers as he trots home from school, are egged on by nonstop TV footage played against patriotic songs. Imad proudly claims he averages three hours a day in the clashes. 'I'm not afraid,' he says. 'What is death? I'd be on the television, and my friends would be carrying me." (Time Magazine, 2k.10.23, p. 53-4)
The Queen of Sweden has publicly noted that Muslim Arab fathers and mothers are sending their children into harm's way. Women are seen in news footage beside the boys – in front of the soldier-aged Muslim Arabs, some whom use slingshots and fire rifles at Israelis to force return fire, inflicting casualties, by design, to women and boys in front of them. Deliberately designed to create graphic scenes favorable to the Muslim Arabs for TV and other journalists, women and children are deliberately placed in the forefront of the fray while armed Muslim Arab police and militiamen fire from behind the women and children, forcing Israeli soldiers to try to fire around the women and children to defend themselves against the Muslim Arab police. Their tactic makes it inexorable that, out of self defense, soldiers will sometimes miss their targets, hitting the women and children instead.
"A schoolchild who wore my children's outgrown clothes was Mohammed [al-Dura]" wrote Helen Schary Motro (Jerusalem Post, 2k.10.19, p. 8).
"At first I stared with the rest of the horrified world at the photo of the anonymous Muslim Arab father holding his anonymous Muslim Arab son – father wounded, son dead. Only after reading the description in the newspaper did I realize he was not anonymous to me.
"Mohammed's father was our Jamal.
"Our Jamal [al-Dura] who, working for an Israeli contractor I hired, had helped build my Israeli house at the height of the intifada and maintained it afterwards.
"In 1988 Jamal was an angry young man. Tall, thin and glowering, he kept to himself and spoke in monosyllables. I had just had my baby when I met Jamal; his wife was pregnant with their first child. I tried to give him my old maternity clothes, but Jamal turned his back, too proud [or too consumed with hatred? ybd] to accept them.
"The terrified boy the whole world saw screaming in the crook of his father's arm and slumped dead a moment later was the child Jamal's wife had been carrying.
"Ten years later I hired the same contractor to repaint my house. Tha Jamal who walked up the garden stairs was a changed man. He was 35 but looked 50. He limped and his hair was flecked with gray. For a decade Jamal had been rising from his bed at 3:30 a.m. to take the bus at four to the border crossing, then board a second bus an hour later out of Gaza, to begin work at six. This backbreaking cycle of physical labor was a journey he prayed to make; without it there would be no work at all…
"Jamal told me he now had six children. This time he accepted the bags of used clothing and discarded toys I left for him to take…
"Jamal's first public statement was to call for avenging Mohammed's death. To this, his Israeli boss responded by quoting Talmud: 'A man is not to be held accountable in the time of his sorrow.'
"Then, a few days after the shooting, everybody in Israel heard Jamal say live to them on Israel radio [which wasn't reported in international media; ybd]: 'I am a man of peace. We two peoples must live together. There is no other possibility, no other possibility.'"
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 "Palistani" Arab Muslims rejoicing with bloodied hands holding out intestines of two lynched Israelis who took wrong turn into Ramallah (2000.10.12). Click photos below for enlargements. | ||
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| "Palistani" Muslim Arab Vigilante "Street Justice" Lynchings | ||
Thanks to Italian Cinque 5 Channel, the only team able to smuggle a video past Muslim Arab officials who confiscated all of the other news teams' tapes. The far less coverage afforded by CNN to the Ramallah lynching, compared to their coverage of the 12-year-old boy who was sent by his mother and father to become a hero-martyr, demonstrated yet again that CNN's coverage is highly unbalanced. No western or European mother or father could grasp sending their son into the middle of a firefight to become a 'hero-martyr.' For Muslim Arab Arabs whose leaders and Islamic clerics understand how world media works, however, ibt's a boy's rite of passage to manhood and respect.
Eyewitness Account by British photographer Mark Seager
(Updated from Jerusalem Post, 2k.10.27, p. A5)
"I had arrived in Ramallah at about 10:30 a.m. and was getting into a taxi on the main road to go to Nablus, where there was to be a funeral that I wanted to film, when all of a sudden there came a big crowd of Muslim Arabs shouting and running down the hill from the police station.
"I got out of the car to see what was happening and saw that they were dragging something behind them. Within moments they were in front of me and, to my horror, I saw that it was a body, a man they were dragging by the feet. The lower part of his body was on fire and the upper part had been shot at, and the head beaten so badly that it was a pulp, like red jelly.
"I thought he was a soldier because I could see the remains of khaki trousers and boots. My God, I thought, they've killed this guy. He was dead, he must have been dead, but they were still beating him, madly, kicking his head. They were like animals.
"They were just a few feet in front of me and I could see everything.
"Instinctively, I reached for my camera. I was composing the picture when I was punched in the face by a Muslim Arab. Another Muslim Arab pointed right at me shouting 'no picture, no picture!' …
"At the same time, the [dead] guy that looked like a soldier was being beaten and the crowd was getting angrier and angrier, shouting 'Allahu Akbar' [God is great]. They were dragging the dead man around the street like a cat toying with a mouse. It was the most horrible thing that I have ever seen, and I have reported from Congo, Kosovo, many bad places… but it wasn't like this. There was such hatred, such unbelievable hatred and anger distorting their faces…
"I thought that I'd got to know the Muslim Arabs well. [As I've heard so many journalists and foreigners claim; ybd] I've made six trips this year and had been going to Ramallah every day for the past 16 days. I thought they were kind, hospitable people. I know they are not all like this and I'm a very forgiving person, but I'll never forget this. It was murder of the most barbaric kind. When I think about it, I see that man's head, all smashed. I know that I'll have nightmares for the rest of my life…
"Afterwards, I heard even worse details like that the [soldier's] wife was phoning his mobile [cell phone] to see if he was all right and them telling her that they were killing him. From what I saw, I can believe that." [This was also reported independently in an interview with his wife; ybd]
It is clear that the era of stone & PR wars requires meticulous attention to documenting all instances of Muslim Arab aggression, use of children & women, firing from residential areas, churches or hospitals, and the like. The IDF must make ample copies available to all media. Digital camcorders can produce both video coverage and still photos suitable for instant transmission and publishing in all media including the web. Uninterrupted, uncensored, and unedited documentation of Muslim Arab aggression and tactics from the earliest moments must be the primary assignment of the Documentation Officer. Clearly, conduct of IDF soldiers must be professional at all times. The brunt of this war will be won or lost in the media. [Note: the Jerusalem Post reported about the time this was posted or the following day that the IDF has begun issuing camcorders to front line units. No results have made airtime on CNN or BBC thus far.]
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